Australia: Smokers Who Light up in Some Public Places Risk Fines

Source from:  Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) (au)  01/09/2013

Smoking in selected outdoor public places becomes illegal from Monday, January 7.

Anyone caught lighting up at playgrounds, sports grounds, swimming pools and the entrance to all public buildings faces a $550 fine.

Northern Tablelands MP, Richard Torbay, who chaired the joint parliamentary committee on tobacco smoking, says the amendments are a good thing.

"I took the Committee to the Emphysema Unit at the Concord Hospital and I'll never forget that visit as long as I live; people younger than my father struggling to breathe," he said.

"One particular sufferer said to me, 'We didn't know that it would do this much damage,' and now we are continuing with the recommendations which, I think, are totally consistent with the community's expectations."

It will also be an offence to smoke on railway platforms, at taxi ranks, and at bus stops.

Richard Torbay says the Committee heard terrible evidence at its public hearings in 2006 of the effects of passive smoking, and learned tobacco companies were doing little to address the problem.

"Well, look, for years they swept under the carpet the impacts, for years they have been denying those impacts, but we know those health outcomes and what's come out since has proven the situation," he said.

"So, governments at all levels are acting to reduce smoking and I'll certainly support giving people the best chance at life and that's something that I think every reasonable person has said." Enditem